Anchorman
2: The Legend Continues
doesn't duplicate the same setup or jokes (well, save for one that becomes
nothing more than excuse for a string of cameos) as its
predecessor, but it does repeat the same central mistake. Like the first movie, the sequel squanders its promising satirical
premise—gender politics in the media in the first movie and the advent of the
24-hour news channel in this one—for gags that really have nothing to do with
the situation or even the characters. By
the time our chauvinistic hero is nursing a baby great white shark (Yes, you
read that correctly, but hey, at least he uses a bottle), the movie has
essentially gotten into a competition with itself to come up with more absurdly
unrelated jokes with each successive scene.

Admittedly,
some of it amusing, and in fact, when the cobbled-together screenplay by star
Will Ferrell and director Adam McKay focuses on the silly workings of the news
network in question, the movie has some satirical bite, even if the observations
are as obvious as the joke of having the network's name be GNN. The movie has something to say about the over-saturated media going to
non-news-worthy lengths to capture an audience's attention, but when the movie
gets to a long speech explaining why that undermines the purpose of journalism,
we have to wonder just how many disparate attitudes are here.

The
story picks up some years after the first one in the year 1980. One at least has to appreciate that the movie uses its setting as a fact
and not as fodder for lazy jokes about outdated technology and contemporary fads
(More technical-minded folks, though, will wonder why television broadcasts of
the era are shot in scope).

Anyway,
Ron Burgundy (Ferrell) and his wife Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate)
are now co-anchors on a national network's weekend news program, and the
weeknight newsman is about to retire after 30 years on the job. Veronica gets the gig, and Ron is fired, sending him into a downward
spiral of self-loathing that involves him drunkenly announce a dolphin show at a
theme park and fail at a suicide attempt.

Walking
in on the distraught Ron is Freddie Shapp (Dylan Baker), who's seeking on-air
talent for the first 24-hour news channel. Ron
thinks it's a terrible idea but can't pass up the pay, so he takes the job on
the condition of being able to select his own team.

We get
reacquainted with the supporting characters who, in the first movie, seemed
important at the beginning but ultimately had little to do with story as it
progressed, and they get to go through the same motion here. Champ Kind (David Koechner), the sports reporter who knows nothing about
sports and eventually uses this as a strength in his new job by just presenting
highlights, owns a fried chicken restaurant that actually sells fried bat meat. Brian Fantana (Paul Rudd), the investigative reporter who later focuses
on sex for his stories, is a successful photographer of cats. Brick Tamland (Steve Carell), the incredibly dumb weatherman, is presumed
dead but ends up giving his own eulogy, gradually having to be convinced that
he's actually alive.

Because
of a bet with the network's star anchor Jack Lime (James Marsden), Ron and his
team accidentally become the prototype for the sort of sensationalistic excuse
for journalism that modern cable news has become. They cover a local car chase, a story about a woman who cut off her
husband's penis, the rankings of women's genitalia throughout history, and
package it all in phony patriotism. It
would be funny, but it's basically a copy of exactly what we see today on the
24-hour news cycle.

Worse,
though, is that these characters become grating rather quickly. Ron in particular is just a walking, talking ego that has no ability to
self-censor, leading to a few uncomfortable and unfunny scenes involving his
boss (Meagan Good), to whom Ron continually says the word "black" upon
first meeting her because she's a black woman. It's at least less offensively annoying than when he tries to affect a
certain way of speaking while having dinner with her family.

Yes,
Ron is the butt of the joke, but that joke just isn't funny in big doses (The
exception is a consistently amusing—but still too long—sequence in which he
becomes blind and either refuses or is unable to use his other senses). That, though, gives Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues far too much credit by implying
the movie actually has some kind of comedic philosophy beyond blindly throwing
darts at a dartboard.